Daniel Asia - Ivory (2001)

Daniel Asia describes all his music as "quasi-tonal," at least in the sense that each composition tends to work back around to the harmonic region in which it begins. Premiered in 1987, Asia wrote the Scherzo Sonata especially for Jonathan Shames, who premiered it at Cornell University. The work capitalizes on the intense hailstorms of notes that periodically subside into ethereal calm over the course of a seven-movement work. The primary tonality of this piece, for example, is D. The opening melodic fragment starts on the note D, and the first movement ends on the dominant, A flat. The final movement closes the work out in D, and three of the inner movements—the scherzi that give the sonata its name—each begin by emphasizing the major third interval of D and F sharp. Even listeners who find such a description too technical can sense that the music keeps returning to a harmonic "home," that Asia is not merely splattering his thematic elements around the keyboard at random.

Tracklist

Scherzo Sonata 33:50
I. Adagio 7:43
II. Scherzo 3:16
III. Allegretto 2:54
IV. Scherzo 4:17
V. Adagietto 3:18
VI. Scherzo 5:03
VII. Adagio 7:19

Piano Quartet 25:04
I. Tranquillo 7:48
II. Adagio/Allegro 9:51
III. Dance-like 7:26

Why: (?) Jacob 8:17

The Bridge Ensemble
Jonathan Shames, piano

Summit Records: SUM 286